To my absolute sweet surprise, the mailman greeted me today with a copy of Star Wars Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II from LucasArts. I wasn’t planning on getting this game at all today, and low and behold, it was in my mailbox. I grabbed my cell phone and called my buddy Ben (who I had planned on playing this with on Wednesday), and said our schedule has been altered and we were going to get our game on tonight. He canceled his plans, and was instructed to pick up a twelve of Dew, and be at my house at 8pm. I had like 10 million things to do today, so I held back kept the game in plastic until Ben arrived. Okay, I lied…I had it loaded, but did not play.

Ben got here, and we got all situated. We turned the volume up loud, and powered on. Lucas Arts intro’s have been evolving through out the years, and I’ve seen them all. But, dancing storm troopers has to be one of the best LucasArts intros I’ve ever seen.

I created my save game file (PGC of course), and got to the level select screen where I toggled back and forth between the Tatooine Training Level, and the Death Star Level. Ben yells, “F*** the training dude, go blow up the Death Star!” And that was it. Decision made. I went after the Death Star. Even though I blew up the Death Star at E3 and Cube Clubs, for some reason I kept dying this time and didn’t complete the level. I was messing around a lot with the controls, and trying to see what I could and couldn’t get away with. And the explosions are just so darn pretty. I handed Ben the controller, and he was off.

Just observing really gave me a chance to see how beautiful this game is. The menus, the cut-scenes, and absolutely everything in the game is visually stunning. Your eyes will shoot out of your head, and splatter on the screen. The graphics are that good. Seeing how many lasers, asteroids, and Tie Fighters are all flying around on the screen at once is just breathtaking. And everything runs at a brisk pace. Rogue Leader is actually so beautiful, it’s difficult to see the enemy fighters sometimes. You’ll really need to utilize your targeting computer to see the enemies when you’re flying in space, because it’s sometimes hard to figure out which is a fighter, and debris, or something else. Maybe it just takes some getting used to. Time will tell.

The walls instantly shook from the intense audio. If there’s one thing I love, it’s loud Star Wars music. My surround setup was kickin’ it out loud and proud, and Ben and I basically sauced ourselves just from the audio. I have a decent surround setup (watch out neighbors, I’m getting a sub soon.), and I was in aural heaven. It basically sounds like you are right smack in the middle of the movie. You are sonically in the game. My neighbors are going to loooooooooove me.

I’ve played the game a little bit prior to this, but really wanted to experience the game at home. I am more than impressed with the game play. As Ben put it, “The game feels familiar”. If you’ve played Rogue Squadron on N64 you’ll feel right at home. Sure there are some additions to the controls, but it’s fairly easy to get used to. I’m still getting messed up with the targeting computer, and using some of the different weapons (the ion cannon is a pain), but over all, it’s nice to ease on the brakes, close in on a Tie Fighter, and snap a wing off.

Okay, so for this entire set of impressions all I have done is gushed about Rogue Leader. Is there anything wrong with the game? I did see a graphical glitch when I crashed during the trench run, and the X-Wing fluttered for a bit. Not a big deal, but both Ben and I noticed it. Then after we had been playing the game for about an hour, I was just about to finish the Hoth level, and the game locked up on me. It froze up, and wouldn’t even soft boot (by hitting reset). I had to restart, and then go back and replay the mission. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but we haven’t seen that happen since.

Overall though, I am thoroughly impressed with Rogue Leader. It’s the Star Wars game that I’ve been waiting to play since 1977. Rogue Squadron was an excellent game on the N64. It took console Star Wars games to the next level. Rogue Leader will put you inside the movie. Kudos to Factor 5. Rogue Leader is definitely one of the first AAA titles for the GameCube.